


All I Ever Wanted

by IvanW



Category: Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies)
Genre: Admiral Kirk, Ambassador Spock, Angst, Bonds, Implied/Referenced Sexual Assault, Implied/Referenced Torture, Love Renewal, M/M, Memory Loss, Older Characters, Past, Permanent Injury, Pining, Romance, broken bonds, ex-husbands
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-03-06
Updated: 2019-03-20
Packaged: 2019-03-27 16:07:13
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 13
Words: 17,652
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13884360
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/IvanW/pseuds/IvanW
Summary: Captain James T. Kirk was abducted by an alien race that had violently tortured him for months. Starfleet declared him dead. When he was found and rescued it was discovered that he had suffered a permanent brain injury, resulting in significant memory loss. Though Kirk was able to eventually recover and assume command of the Enterprise, his memories of his crew, his friends, and his husband never returned.





	1. Admiral Kirk's Visit

The young lieutenant, Giverson, arrived breathing hard and flushed red and immediately apologized the moment he reached Spock’s table. “I’m so sorry, Ambassador Spock. I didn’t mean to keep you waiting.”

Spock gestured to the seat across from him. “Please be seated.”

Giverson fumbled himself into a chair. “It’s just that I got caught up in the crowds in the street.” He leaned forward with no little eagerness. “Admiral Kirk is here, so you can imagine everyone wanting to see him.”

“Yes.”

Giverson leaned back then, looking at Spock rather curiously. “You used to serve with him, didn’t you?”

“I was his first officer on board the Enterprise for a number of years.”

“Wow, to serve as the first officer of Kirk. Well. He’s a legend.”

Spock nodded.

“I guess you are too, sir.”

Spock waved this away and reached for the messenger bag Giverson had brought with him to deliver to Spock.

“You served with him…before, right?” Giverson had lowered his voice. “Before the memory loss?”

Spock tried not to flinch but it was a near thing. “Yes, Lieutenant.”

“So you knew him when he saved Earth all those times before.” Giverson shook his head. “That’s amazing.”

Admiral James Kirk, a captain at the time, had been abducted by an alien race that had violently tortured him for months. He had been declared dead by Starfleet. When he was finally rescued, he had lost a third of his body weight and had suffered permanent brain damage that had resulted in significant memory loss. He remembered none of his life before his rescue and had to be retrained in most things. The memory loss was irreversible and to the crew of the Enterprise, devastating to know their beloved captain remembered none of them. He had not even remembered his mother.

He’d been shown a lot of his life through video captures, recordings and documentation, but it was not the same. Admiral Kirk had gone on to command the Enterprise once more and had earned legendary status all over again.

But the loss for some of them was permanent.

Spock among them.

“Will you see the admiral while he’s here, Ambassador?”

“Yes,” Spock replied.

“I envy you, sir,” Giverson said. “He’s my hero.”

Hours later, Spock waited at a quiet vegetarian restaurant that he had chosen himself for their dinner. Jim was ten minutes late, but he did arrive, and sat across Spock with a readymade smile.

“Spock, hey, how are you?” His blue eyes sparkled, and there were crinkles by those eyes, and gray in his sandy colored hair, and perhaps he’d put on some weight, but to Spock he looked stunning.

“I am well, Jim.”

“It’s good to see you.” Jim smiled at the waitress who stopped at their table. “A glass of merlot, please.”

It was, of course, good to see Jim, as well. He rarely saw his former…captain anymore. His former captain. So much more. That life was no more. And Jim did  not remember any of it.

Spock, however, did. And he yearned for it.

“I can’t believe all the fuss they’re making,” Jim was saying. “And anyway, I think I’m staying this time.”

“You intend to stay in San Francisco?” Spock asked, surprised.

“I’m not getting any younger. And it’s getting a little harder to pretend otherwise,” Jim said with an engaging grin. “Time I left the planet rescuing to the younger guys. What about you, Spock?”

“Me, Admiral?”

“Are you staying here for a while or back to New Vulcan or elsewhere?”

“I shall be here for a little while.”

Jim’s smile widened. “Yeah? I’d love to catch up.”

Of course, Spock could never entirely catch Jim up on everything. Jim had been told they’d had a relationship, yes, but one that Jim had not recalled and therefore it was as though he had never participated in it. He did not remember falling in love with Spock or even meeting him that first time. And he did not remember Spock falling in love with him.

Jim’s smile faltered a little. “Are you okay?”

“Of course, Jim.”

Jim nodded. “Yeah? Cause I’d really like to talk further. Not here. There are so many nosey people around. Maybe after dinner? Could I come to your apartment?”

“That would be agreeable,” Spock replied, trying to keep his voice even. He felt eager and yet he did not know for what. Jim was his ex now. They had never been able to rekindle what was between them. And yet, for Spock, it had never died.

****

Spock would never forget the first time between them. It was right after their new ship had been finished on Yorktown and they’d continued onto finish their mission. While still on Yorktown, he and Nyota had made the final decision to remain friends only.

Spock had been somewhat injured on a mission and after being released from the medbay to his quarters, there had been someone at his door.

It was Jim.

“Spock! Are you all right? I can’t believe you got hurt again,” Jim had babbled. “You have to stop doing that. I can’t—”

“Jim, I am all right.”

Jim searched Spock’s gaze, looking very unhappy and his eyes looked almost wet. “Are you sure? Because if Bones released you too early, I’ll…” He took two steps closer to Spock until he was standing right in front of him, in fact so close Spock could feel his heat and his…desperation.

When Jim suddenly kissed him, Spock was not surprised. He had been about to kiss Jim.

They’d spent hours that first night getting to know each other intimately in every way and thereafter they’d spent every night together for the next year until Spock asked Jim to bond with him.

They’d gone to New Vulcan and formally bonded, with Starfleet’s permission, and then had gone through a human marriage ceremony as well.

It was the most content Spock had ever been.

Until Jim was abducted and presumed dead.

His world had changed in every way.

Before Spock knew that Jim had survived, his father had talked Spock into getting their bond formally dissolved because his time was coming and he would need to be bonded to someone else in order to make it through Pon Farr. He’d then been bonded to a Vulcan woman for the duration of his time.

It was after that, that Jim had been discovered by another passing ship alive and imprisoned with his irreversible brain damage.

Spock blamed himself. Leonard blamed himself. There weren’t a lot of crew members that didn’t blame themselves. And in the end, though they had their captain back, and his name was still James T. Kirk, he had very little in common with their beloved captain. At times Jim had stared right through them. He knew nothing of his friendship with the doctor, nothing of his love with Spock. He didn’t remember his childhood, or Tarsus, or anything, really.

He recalled being a prisoner and being tortured and that his name was James T. Kirk. Everything else he’d had to relearn.

Though Spock had informed him of their relationship, he had not told him they were married and bonded. It seemed pointless as all that was over now. Jim viewed him as a stranger.

Now Jim was asking to see him privately after their dinner. They had barely spoken or seen each other for the last few years and Spock did not know what to expect.

“You’re really deep in thought,” Jim said as he twirled his glass of merlot in his hand. “Are you sure you’re all right?”

“Of course, Jim.”

“And how’s your daughter, T’Mara? Have you seen her lately?”

“She is well and quite engaged in her studies,” Spock replied. “I saw her a month ago when I was able to be on New Vulcan for a time period.”

Jim shook his head. “I still can’t believe all that happened with Vulcan and Nero. And to think I was a part of that and can’t remember any of it.” He sighed. Grimaced.

“Do not strain yourself to recall something that cannot be recalled.”

“Yeah. It’s just, people stop me and ask me about all that and other stuff too and I just…” He stopped, licked his lips. “It’s frustrating not to know what they’re talking about. And I’m sure it is for them too.”

Spock certainly was well aware of that but he did not say so.

Still Jim gazed upon him in silence for a moment. “Sorry,” he murmured. “Sometimes I can be obtuse.”

“No.”

“Yes.” He looked away. “I wish I could remember us the way you do.”

“Kaiidth.”

“That just seems like something to say when you don’t like something but can’t do anything about it.”

“Yes,” Spock agreed.

Jim pinched the bridge of his nose. “Some things I guess maybe I’m better off not remembering, I don’t know. My mother says so. She’s been working with me, helping me to get back some of it. At least to know what it is I’m not remembering.”

“And how is that going?”

“Good, I think. At least I’m getting a better picture of my life before I became aware again. But there are things she can’t really help with.” He bit his lip. “That’s, there’s some things, I want to talk to you about, if you’re willing.”

“I will assist you in any way I am able, Jim. Always.”

He smiled. “Great. Great. How’s your food?””

“It is good.”

“Mine too.” His gaze became distant again, as though he was focused on something else, somewhere else, and so Spock spent the remainder of dinner watching him. Even that was a comfort to him.

****

Spock opened his apartment door. Once it had been intended to be their apartment in San Francisco. When they’d both slowed down and spent most of their time there. Spock perhaps teaching again, Jim as admiral giving other captains orders.

It had been chosen with all that in mind. They’d contacted a broker from the ship and had the place picked out and even decorated for their future.

One that Spock never got to have.

It was only his apartment now and Jim only recognized it as such from the few times he’d been there. Very few.

Jim smiled as he stopped by the sliding doors that led out to a patio and garden. Spock remembered them looking at holopics together in their shared quarters.

_“Oh, look. Look. I’d love to grow a garden,” Jim declared as he pointed out the space._

_“You?” Spock asked doubtfully. “What do you know about gardening, adun?”_

_“Well.” Jim grinned. “Nothing. But I can learn. We’ll learn together.”_

Spock was haunted by such conversations.

Now Jim merely smiled vaguely as he looked out at the patio, the still unused garden space.

“Oh,” Jim said into the awkward silence. “I saw Bones a week or so ago. He said to say hello if I saw you.”

“That is kind.”

When they had first got Jim back, he did not know about calling McCoy ‘Bones’ and therefore for a long time he would not do so. It was an odd nickname to him without context. It was always Leonard or McCoy even and Spock had watched the doctor’s spirts sag lower and lower.

The day Jim had finally called him Bones, the doctor had cried. Not in front of Jim, but later when he’d gone for a drink with Spock, Nyota and Scott.

“I really like this place, by the way,” Jim said, seemingly unaware of all the emotional turmoil he had caused. “You did a great job with decorating it.”

“Would you care for tea or coffee perhaps? I do have a small coffee maker available should you wish to forgo replicated.”

“I wouldn’t want to make you go to any trouble.”

“It is no trouble.” Spock went into his kitchen and the light automatically came on. Jim followed him into it.

“This looks like a cook’s kitchen.”

Indeed it had been chosen for that also since they’d both liked to cook when it was available.

“Do you cook a lot, Spock?” Jim shrugged. “Doesn’t seem like something you’d like to do.”

“I do not cook much these days,” Spock admitted. “In the past I…” He shook his head. “I do not spend much time here with my travels as an ambassador.”

In that he had not intended to follow in the footsteps of his counterpart so long ago. He’d wanted to return to teaching, not to diplomacy. But so much was different than what he’d wanted.

“I guess you don’t see your wife much. On New Vulcan when you saw your daughter?”

Spock stiffened. “It is not necessary for us to endure each other’s company under normal circumstances.”

Jim frowned a little as he watched Spock fuss with the coffee maker. “That’s a weird relationship.”

“Because it is not one. She was specifically chosen because she did not desire a committed bond with me. We have both given serious consideration to dissolving it altogether.”

“But that could affect you when your time comes again.”

Spock would not look at him. “Please. I do not wish to discuss such intimacies.”

“I understand. It’s just…”

Spock glanced at him. “What?”

“Well, what about Uhura?”

“What about her?”

“You two used to be together.” Jim crossed his arms in front of his chest. It was very defensive. “Before, you and me, right?”

“As Humans would say, Admiral, that ship has sailed.”

“Okay.” Jim nodded. “I guess what I’m saying is…”

“What are you saying?”

“When your time comes I don’t want you to die because you don’t have a bondmate.” Jim huffed.

Spock thrust a mug of coffee at Jim. “While I appreciate your concern, it really is not something you need to be worried about.”

“I’m not worried about it, Spock. Well, not really.”

Spock quickly made himself some tea. “Since you indicated you wanted to discuss something I suggest we adjoin to the living room.”

“Right.”

Spock left the kitchen with a pot of tea and a cup for himself which he set upon a side table next to his sofa.

When Jim was seated, Spock said, “What do you want to talk about?”

“Us.”


	2. Crescent Shaped Holes

It really was a nice place, Jim could not deny, but being there made him a little uncomfortable. There was some significance about this apartment that was just out of reach of Jim’s brain, but he saw it in Spock’s body language and his sad dark eyes.

He tried to hide it. Jim gave Spock credit for that. Jim suspected Spock’s shields were firmly in place. But he wasn’t as good at hiding his emotions as he thought. Not from Jim, anyway. And Jim realized there was likely something there too.

Jim’s gaze drifted to the patio and the unused garden there and back to Spock, who sat stiff and unyielding.

It was hard to imagine himself with a Vulcan, even one who was only half-Vulcan. Spock was uncommonly attractive, there was no denying that, but Jim, from what he’d learned about himself, and how he himself felt, was such an emotional, touchy sort of being. He would never have guessed someone like Spock would have been remotely interested in someone like him.

And yet, Jim had spent many nights wondering what their intimate life had been comprised of. Since returning, or rather being returned, to his former life, such as he could recall, Jim had found such personal intimacy to be impossible. After numerous sessions with professional help, they’d all come to the conclusion that Jim’s time in captivity had been most horrendous, likely the reason Jim avoided sexual intimacy. He liked to be touched though. That much had, apparently, not changed.

Spock looked at him expectantly.

“We were bonded,” Jim said softly.

He had almost expected Spock to deny it or at least act surprised, but he simply nodded.

“Why didn’t you mention that?”

“Our bond was officially severed when you were declared dead so that I could partake of a new bond. It seemed irrelevant under the circumstances.”

Jim pressed the thumb nail of his right hand into his left palm. “Still, clearly our relationship was not at all casual if we went through a bonding ceremony.” He paused. “And a wedding.”

“Your mother?” Spock guessed.

Jim nodded. “Yes. To be fair, she assumed that you would have mentioned it.”

“I never advised our relationship was casual.”

“No.” Jim licked his dry lips. “That’s true. But you didn’t mention it had progressed to such…permanence.”

Spock shook his head. “Not permanent as it turned out. Since we are no longer bonded, as I said, it seemed irrelevant.”

“And our marriage? Did you divorce me?”

“Negative. Since you were presumed dead, it did not seem required,” Spock admitted.

Jim chewed his lip. “That means, technically, we are still married. How come I didn’t know that?”

“Your memory—”

Jim waved his hand at that. “I know that. But why didn’t anyone _tell_ me? You, Bones, Uhura, _Starfleet_. ‘Hey, Jim, you have a husband’.”

“If you wish to initiate a divorce in order to pursue a new marriage you are well within your rights to do so.”

“That isn’t what this is about, Spock.”

Spock exhaled quite slowly. “In truth, the marriage ceremony was only a formality and concession for you. Vulcans do not recognize it in the way humans do. Since our bond was severed I considered the matter concluded.”

“Especially considering you bonded with a Vulcan female.”

Spock nodded once.

Jim covered his face with his hands and leaned over.

“Jim, are you unwell?”

“No.” He lowered his hands and straightened. His hand throbbed where he had been stabbing it with his nail. “This is just a lot to take in, Spock.”

“I am aware.”

“What do we do now?”

“There is nothing you need do at all, Admiral.”

Jim rose from the couch and went to stand at the patio door, looking outside. “So, you have no emotional attachment to me now?”

Spock did not respond and Jim was hardly surprised. He shook his head.

“Do you really intend to dissolve your bond with T’Mara’s mother?”

“She has expressed a desire to do so. She wishes to choose another mate. And we are not especially compatible.”

Jim leaned against the glass door and closed his eyes. “Who are you compatible with, Spock?”

“My intent is to remain un-bonded once this bond has been dissolved,” Spock said quietly.

Jim opened his eyes and turned back to face Spock. “And when you go through Pon Farr again? What then?”

“There are surrogates for those sorts of times.” Spock spoke stiffly, almost pained.

He took a step forward. “You could do it with me.”

“No,” Spock said quickly. Too quickly.

Jim frowned. “Why the hell not? You chose me once!”

Spock got up from the couch himself and began to pace. “Because we are not together anymore. And I will not hurt you.”

“That’s my choice.”

“No. It is mine. I am aware that you were…poorly treated in captivity. I refuse to use you in the manner required for Pon Farr. I would rather die then—”

“That’s ridiculous.”

Spock stopped pacing. “Nevertheless, it is the way it is. The simple truth is you are no longer capable of fulfilling the requirements needed for a mate. Besides my time, I also require mental stability.”

Jim sucked in a breath. “I see.”

“I very much doubt that you do,” Spock replied softly. “And if I could change the outcome, I would surely do so.”

Jim felt the prick of something in his mind and behind his eyes, but he ruthlessly pushed that away as he had decided he would never show weakness again.

“Then, why won’t you find someone else to bond with?” he asked.

Spock shook his head.

Jim walked over to where Spock stood and grabbed his arms right below his biceps. “Talk to me here. What’s going on with you?”

“That would be unwise.”

“Spock.” Jim gritted his teeth. “Just tell me. Just…we were close once, right? Very close. Mom said…”

“What?”

“It was like we breathed for each other.” Jim sighed, shook his own head.

Spock’s lips thinned and he looked away, over Jim’s head, toward, nothing, Jim guessed. Just anywhere but at Jim.

“There is no one else for me,” Spock whispered. “You were all I ever wanted.”

“Then—”

But Spock pulled out of Jim’s grasp and put as much physical distance as there seemed to be emotional distance between them.

“I find that I am tired and in need of meditation,” Spock told him, back to Jim.

“Are you telling me to leave, Spock?”

Spock hesitated, obviously torn between the truth and not wishing to be rude.

“Fine, I’ll go. My hotel suite isn’t far from here. Can probably walk it.”

“I can get you transportation,” Spock offered.

“No. I may be ‘mentally unstable’ but I think I can manage that.”

“Jim—”

“Never mind. It was a cheap shot. Meet me for breakfast at the hotel restaurant.”

“Admiral—”

“Breakfast, Spock. The Hotel Marimont. Nine. I don’t want to have to get up too early.”

He waited for Spock’s nod of agreement and then he opened the door of the apartment and walked out, closing the door behind him.

For a long time, probably longer than necessary, he stood in the hallway, looking at the number on the door. Even ran his fingertips across the raised area.

Then he pulled his hand back and looked at the injuries he’d inflicted on the palm of his hand. Several crescent shaped wounds, lightly smeared with blood.

_“A coping mechanism during stress.”_

Or so his last doctor had advised.

Jim wished he could cope through less violent means. Fortunately, back at his hotel he had a regenerator. With a heavy sigh, he finally turned and made his way to the stairs that would take him out of the apartment building and to the street below.


	3. Memory Comes When Memory's Old I Am Never the First to Know

As soon Jim stepped outside on his way to his hotel, he pulled his coat tight around him. It was a cold night. Or it felt cold to him. He didn’t know if that was because he was getting older or if it would have felt cold to him in his twenties.

He’d seen numerous old pictures of himself. Or perhaps young pictures would be the more accurate description. He hadn’t particularly looked cold in any of them.

“How does one look cold?” he murmured to himself.

The hotel really was close. Only about five blocks down and a straight shot at that. But he found himself wishing he’d gotten the transportation after all. Walking left him with far too much time to think. And thinking wasn’t always wise. Too much missing information.

As he neared the hotel, a guy who looked vaguely like he might be part Human and part Tellarite and just a tad threatening took a step toward him.

“Don’t even think about it,” Jim said, showing the guy the phaser tucked into his coat.

The man backed away and Jim kept on walking.

He was not surprised to find a message waiting for him. After all, she’d known of his plans to see Spock.

Jim sat down before the terminal on the hotel desk and brought her up.

“Christine.”

Christine Chapel smiled her soft smile at him as she leaned forward. She wore a pristine white doctor’s uniform.

“Hello Jim.”

Jim shrugged out of his coat and left it on the back of the chair. “Am I interrupting anything?”

She shook her head. “You’re my last scheduled patient for the night.”

“I’m not keeping you from anything personal, am I? We can talk tomorrow.”

“Don’t worry. I anticipated tonight.” Her chair squeaked as she leaned back in it. “How’d it go?”

Jim sighed. “Not well. It’s…frustrating.”

“You can’t make yourself remember by pushing it, Jim. Those memories are just not there,” she reminded him gently. “All the concentration in the world isn’t going to bring them back.”

“Everyone expects otherwise.”

“Everyone or you? I don’t think Spock expects that.”

“He might not expect it, but he…wants it.” Jim closed his eyes briefly. Then opened them to look at her. “I sense such sorrow in him.”

“That’s understandable, isn’t it? You were his mate, his husband. Jim, you don’t remember, but Spock does.”

“I know and it’s so unfair.”

“It’s the reality of your situation, fair or unfair. You can’t change the way Spock feels, you are not responsible for him. You are only responsible for you.”

“And I don’t even know who I am. Not really.”

“You know who you are. You don’t know who you used to be.”

“I can’t be the Jim they all want me to be, Christine. I don’t know that guy.” He looked away from the screen. “I look at the old pictures and videos of me and it’s like, I’m just watching a stranger. Someone who looks like me but isn’t me at all. Like my twin or something.” He glanced back at her. “Maybe Mom shouldn’t have told me Spock and I were bonded and married.”

“Has it made you feel worse then?”

“More…guilty.”

“Let go of that guilt, Jim. None of this was your doing.”

“It’s not so easy to convince myself of that.”

“Let me see your hands.”

Her sudden command startled him into showing her his hands, palms out, before he thought better of it. He winced when he saw her frown. He realized he should have used the dermal regenerator before contacting her.

“You have to find a more positive means of dealing when you feel stressed, Jim.”

He almost said, ‘I know’ in an effort to convince her to move on from the subject, but when she’d agree to be his shrink, Jim had agreed to be as honest as he could be. So after heaving a sigh, he said, “Mom said when I came back from Tarsus IV I used to cut myself.”

Christine’s eyes softened and then crinkled. “That’s not altogether surprising under those circumstances. You’ve lived through more bad experiences in your relatively short years than many experience over decades of life.”

“And yet I do not recall any of them.”

“Perhaps for the best, yes?”

He smiled slightly. “Do you think so? Really?”

She hesitated and then said, “Our experiences shape us into the people we eventually become.”

“And I got a clean slate after I was tortured.”

She nodded.

“I…I remember some of that, but not all.” And he did too. Vague memories of painful devices attached this his head. Poking and prodding. Images of creatures looming over him. Shadows.

“Honestly, I wish you didn’t remember any of that, Jim. You need to find a more positive way to deal with your stress,” she said again. “How are your attempts at meditation?”

“A joke,” he admitted. “I can’t sit still through it. And anyway, I can’t meditate right through difficult conversations. And I’ve tried the breathing and counting exercises.” He stared down at his wounded palms. At least I’m not cutting, he thought.

In the shower, right after his mother had shared _that_ information, Jim had found just very faint traces of scars on his forearms.

“Meditation isn’t instinctual, it’s learned. Have you given more thought to the courses I suggested?” Then she sighed, likely guessing his answer before he’d even spoken. “I don’t like this tendency to seek out self-harm, Jim. It’s concerning.”

“This is just…minor things.”

“At this point, yes, but what if it becomes more? You’re internalizing everything.” Christine leaned forward again. “Old habits and behaviors that seemed to have survived into this new version of you.”

“I’m not suicidal,” he said sharply.

“If I thought you were I’d have you at the hospital right now,” she advised. “I don’t think that. The meditating and the breathing and all those methods you’ve been learning are to help ease the stress when you are dealing with it.”

“He said I’m mentally unstable.”

“Spock?”

Jim nodded.

“Context?”

He sighed and ran his hand over his face. “Re-bonding I guess.”

“A poor choice of words for Humans, I think. But Vulcans look at facts. Your brain _was_ damaged. Obviously you are fully functional, Jim. And an incredible person as you are now. But the damaged part of your brain might make Vulcan bonds more challenging for both Spock and you.”

“Yeah.” He looked away.

“Is that something you want?” she asked softly.

He glanced at her. “I don’t know. I worry about the-the Pon Farr thing. His bond with T’Mara’s mother is likely to be severed.”

“It’s my understanding from M’Benga that these days there are surrogates for those times. With the population still nowhere close to recovered, there’s little choice. And as I understand it, it’s working for them.”

“He mentioned the surrogates.” He studied her expression and there was kindness but also concern. “You’re worried about my ability to handle it. What…the bond? Or the Pon Farr?”

“Both, honestly. There’s no precedence for your circumstances. No Vulcan has ever been bonded to someone with your health issues,” she said delicately. “And given your issues with physical intimacy…”

“Well.” Jim swallowed heavily and shook his head. “We probably don’t have to worry about that. I don’t think he’s interested given what he said about my unsuitability.”

“And what are your emotions when you think of Spock now, Jim?”

“I care about him. A lot. It just doesn’t seem to be enough for either of us.” He yawned then and she smiled.

“You’re tired. And I think we’re done here for now anyway. Get some rest.”

“Yeah, I’m meeting Spock for breakfast.”

She nodded. “We’ll talk soon, Jim. And don’t push yourself, okay? Heal your hands.”

“I will. Kirk out.”

He rose from behind the desk and went to pick up the regenerator off the hotel dresser. If he really was going to stay in San Francisco, he was going to need a more permanent place to stay. Once he got everything figured out with Starfleet, he’d look for something.

Jim opened the top dresser drawer and set the regenerator back inside it. He picked up the picture his mother had given him the last time he’d seen her.

It was of him and Spock, at their wedding she’d said. Spock and Jim were both dressed in Vulcan robes that contained elaborate embroidery. Jim’s face was turned as he kissed Spock’s cheek. They looked…happy.

And yet, Spock had admitted the Human wedding hadn’t meant anything to him.

Jim felt like he was looking at strangers. He was filled with sadness he could not explain, so he pushed the picture back under some clothes and closed the drawer.

He went to the windows and looked out on the city, feeling dark and empty.


	4. I Remember the Time I Knew What Happiness Was

Spock was delaying leaving to meet Jim for breakfast. He’d been up for hours. He never had been able to sleep late. He was just not mentally programmed for that.

He’d drank a pot and a half of tea and yet still sat at the dining room table of the apartment. And now he had contacted Nyota.

It had been a long time since they’d been romantic partners. At times it seemed like that had been an entirely different Spock, though he knew that was not the case. But he as he was now had trouble recalling when he did not love Jim and perhaps that was why his romantic relationship with Nyota had ultimately failed. 

He’d asked her to go with him to breakfast, knowing that likely wouldn’t please Jim, and yet he had trouble with the idea of facing Jim by himself.

Her long hesitation had him opening his mouth to take back the suggestion, when she finally spoke.

Nyota sighed. “I’d really rather not.”

“I understand.”

“Oh, Spock. I know it’s just awful of me considering what you’ve gone through, what you’re feeling. It’s just…it hurts for him to look at me like I’m just an old neighbor that lived next door to him when he was a kid instead of someone who shared so much of his life, was like family.”

“I understand,” Spock repeated quietly. No one understood more than Spock what it was like to have Jim look at you like you were some college friend he’d known once upon a time instead of your very reason for breathing, for living, for everything.

“Do you hate me?”

“Of course not, Nyota. And I should not have asked you along.”

“I know I should go with you.” She sighed again. “Has anything changed since the last time you saw him?”

“Negative,” Spock replied. “If anything the distance in his gaze has increased.”

“I’m sorry. Could you cancel?”

 

“No,” Spock said softly.

“Are you sure? Because every time you see him, it seems to hurt you more. And I know it’s not often, but—”

“He is still my t’hy’la, Nyota. Even if he does not recall it or want it. I cannot deny him anything.”

And Spock realized if he did not leave at that precise moment he would be late. Something entirely unacceptable to the old Jim. And to Spock as well.

“I must go. We will talk later.” He disconnected without allow Nyota to reply as he rose from his chair and headed out the door to meet Jim at his hotel.

****

Spock walked up to the hostess for the Hotel Marimont at a full three minutes past nine.

“Admiral Kirk?”

The hostess, who looked to be half-Andorian, nodded. “Yes, he’s in there. Table by the window.”

Spock started to move.

“He’s been waiting for fifteen minutes,” she called after him.

Jim faced him but his gaze was out the window at the street outside the hotel upon Spock’s approach. It had been a long time since Spock felt embarrassed but he felt it now.

“I apologize for my tardiness.”

The blue eyes switched to Spock’s face, and for a moment he could make himself belief he saw his beloved, treasured mate there, but the moment passed and blankness returned to Jim’s eyes, almost frightening in their starkness.

“Have a seat,” Jim said, his tone neutral. Spock had once see Captain Kirk berate an ensign for ten minutes for lateness. It was an odd quirk they had shared, their detestation of lateness. “I was beginning to think I’d been stood up.”

“Never. I was communicating with Nyota and lost track of time.” Spock sat across from Jim.

“Is she doing all right?”

“Yes. I invited her to join us but she was unable to come.”

“Did you?” His smile was enigmatic.

“Have you ordered?”

Jim shook his head. “Just coffee. Which I’ve probably drank way too much of already. I’ve got a meeting later at HQ to discuss my role going forward.”

“Your mind is made up to stay Earthbound then?”

“I think so. Depending on what they say, I don’t know, maybe I’ll retire.”

Spock was unable to hide his surprise. “You are still quite young comparatively speaking.”

“I love how you qualified that.” He turned his dazzling smile to the waitress who approached their table. “I’m sure he’ll want hot tea. But otherwise we haven’t had a chance to look at the menus.”

Spock agreed to the tea and then she moved off. He picked up the menu.  

“And you, Spock? What does your future hold?”

“Eventually I will make my way back to New Vulcan. It’s where I intend to make my permanent home eventually when my ambassadorial duties have concluded.”

“What about your apartment here?”

“Once I depart here this time, I intend to let it go.”

“Sell it?”

Spock nodded. “It is no longer a place I wish to spend any length of time in.”

“Maybe I could buy it from you,” Jim said offhandedly. “If I decide to stay in San Francisco, retirement or not, I’ll need a place.”

It made logical sense, of course, but the idea of Jim living in the apartment that was meant for them, perhaps with someone else someday, made Spock feel nauseous. And yet he felt that he must fully disclose the matter.

“We chose that apartment together,” he said after a moment of contemplation.

Jim showed no change of expression but he lost several shades of color. At that moment, the waitress came by with Spock’s tea. Spock watched Jim force himself to interact with her.

“Um, you know, just a couple of over easy eggs for me and some rye toast.”

Spock closed his menu. “The zucchini pancakes. Thank you.”

Jim sighed. “Fuck. I don’t know why I didn’t think of that, Spock. I’m sorry.”

“You owe no apology.”

“I hate this,” Jim murmured. “You have no idea how much.”

“I have a pretty good idea.”

Jim stared at Spock. “Yeah. I guess you do. Anyway, maybe I won’t even stay in San Francisco. There are other places I can go.”

“Where?”

“Mom lives in Riverside, Iowa. I guess I’m from there?” Suddenly, Jim looked away out the window, biting his lip. His hands were clenched into fists.

“Jim, are you all right?”

He shook his head but didn’t look at Spock. “I think you’re right.”

“About what, Jim?”

“Being unstable. I think maybe I’m crazy.” Finally he looked at Spock again. The same hint of familiarity he’d seen in Jim’s gaze when Spock had first arrived at the restaurant was back again. “I saw Christine Chapel last night.”

“After you left the apartment?”

“At my hotel room. Via video conference. I think the stress is…I don’t know,” Jim said abruptly. “You know what? Forget it. You don’t care about any of this.”

“Jim—”

“You made that clear enough last night. You want nothing to do with me, with whatever we were, and I get that. I do. I can’t blame you. You remember things I don’t or can’t or I don’t even know. Sometimes I just want to cry for no reason at all, Spock.”

“Jim, it is all right.”

“No. No it isn’t. I want more than anything to remember everything the way you do. You have no idea how much I want that. I want us to be…us. So much.” His gaze slipped away again, moving across the restaurant, the blankness returning in his eyes. “But it’s gone. And you don’t want that anyway. You want that other Jim. Someone who doesn’t exist anymore. Who’s mentally stable and won’t fuck up your head.”

“Jim, please.”

“I get it. More than you know. You said our bond was severed, right?”

Spock could only nod.

“By whatever was done to me and then, what, in order to bond with T’Mara’s mother, it was officially done.”

“Yes.”

“Okay.” Jim moistened his lips. “Okay. I get all that. But why do I still feel—”

“What?” Spock asked sharply.

Jim tapped his temples. “Something here. Faint. I feel, I don’t know, a presence. And I thought maybe it was them, you know. Th-them. But it doesn’t feel…ominous. Just, I don’t know.” He blew out a breath. “Familiar.”

Spock could only stare at Jim, his heart thundering wildly in his side.

“Is it you?”      


	5. That's Me for You

Jim found it hard to hide his disappointment when all Spock did was stare at him. Clearly Spock was trying to come up with an answer that had nothing to do with him. And really, it probably didn’t. Spock had said their bond had been severed both by his brain damage and for Spock to bond with T’Mara. Whatever Jim felt it was more likely to be tied to his captivity, even if it didn’t feel ominous.

He was temporarily spared from further embarrassment when their breakfast arrived. Jim’s attempt at a smile for the waitress failed before it could fully form.

“More coffee, sir?”

“No, thank you, though.”

The last thing he wanted to do was eat, but he couldn’t forget that his mother had told him he’d been on Tarsus IV. He didn’t remember any of it. But he’d read up on his own files. So he dug his fork into the eggs, cut off a bite, and stuck it into his mouth.

“Jim—”

He waved his fork at Spock. “You know what? Forget it. It’s my head, my problem. It’s nothing to do with you, right?”

“I am uncertain,” Spock said faintly.

“Which means you feel nothing of me on your end. And since you’re the telepath, I’m guessing if it was still our bond, you’d know about it. So, yeah, my problem, not yours.”

“I do not believe that to be true.”

Jim decided to ignore that. Because if it wasn’t their bond, then it was most definitely not Spock’s problem or issue or whatever. And since Spock seemed to prefer to spend his time in isolation on New Vulcan, there was no point to pursuing anything anyway. And yeah that hurt. A lot.

“How long until you think you’ll leave?” he asked instead.

Spock shook his head. “I do not know, but when I do, I believe you should accompany me.”

“For what purpose?”

“To have a healer examine your mind.”

“No.”

“Jim, if what you are experiencing is related to our bond, then it is only logical to have a Vulcan healer examine and confirm that.”

“Forget it. There’s no way someone else, some stranger, is going to probe around in my fucking head. Not again. Never again. I’ve had enough of that to last a lifetime, Spock.”

“Jim, a healer’s examination would be nothing like what you went through while you were held captive.”

“How do you know that? How do you fucking know _anything_ about what I went through?”

Spock looked stricken. “Jim, why are you so angry?”

“Because this is all just so fucked up. Because I love you, right now, I love you, but that doesn’t fucking matter because I’m not the same, I’m not who I was before, and you want _him_ , and I can never be him. I can’t even talk about getting an apartment because it’s all wrapped up in the past of a future we didn’t get to have.” Jim rose from his chair and pushed back. “I should have stayed gone.”

“Jim, _no_ —”

But he didn’t let Spock finish, he turned and rushed out of the restaurant and the hotel to the outside. Tears blinded him and he only got to the park across the street from the hotel when Spock stopped him, hand on his arm, turning him around.

“Spock—”

“I love you,” Spock said quickly. “You are my heart and soul. As I told you before, you are all I ever wanted, and I would take you in any way I could have you. This I promise you.”

“But my mental instability, you said…well you know what you said.”

“I do. And my words were ill-advised. Jim, ashaya, I am uncertain if we can ever be fully bonded as we once were due to what was done to your brain, but I would willingly spend my life with you even without a bond if that is what you truly want.” Spock grabbed Jim’s hands in his and held them. “My fear has been that you could never re-discover your love for me, but if you are certain, that you do love me, then there is nothing that could part me from your side.”

 Jim pulled himself out of Spock’s grasp and took a step back from him, his emotions in turmoil. “I don’t know if-I don’t know if I can ever-intimacy, it’s still—”

He saw when Spock got what he meant. Saw Spock’s look of devastated confusion cleared away. “That does not matter.”

“It does,” Jim said. “Pon Farr—”

Spock sucked in a breath then, glancing around the park in which they stood. “We will not discuss that here. But that is not a consideration.”

“Of course it is.”

“The only thing that matters to me is you,” Spock told him. He stepped closer to Jim and Jim didn’t back away. “There is no real existence without you, Jim. There is life, but no existence. Look into my eyes now. How can you not know?”

Jim bit his lip. “That’s the Jim you remember, but I’m not him. Spock, I can’t remember all that you remember.”

Spock raised shaking hands to Jim’s face. “To me there is only one Jim. You.” His thumb moved up to wipe at a tear Jim hadn’t realized had fallen. “Do not cry. I would do anything to see that you never cry again.”

Jim blinked rapidly, more tears falling unbidden down his cheeks. “I don’t want you to leave me.”

“I will not.”

“You don’t deserve to be burdened with me.”

“We share all burdens, even those of ourselves.”

“Is it you, Spock?” he dared to ask again. “In my head.”

“It must be,” Spock replied. “I can accept no other alternative.”

Jim stepped closer to Spock and even though he knew they were out here in the middle of a park where anyone could see them and it might make Spock horribly uncomfortable, he put his arms around Spock. He leaned his head against Spock’s shoulder and almost wept in relief when Spock’s arms encircled his waist, and then slipped up to his back, holding him very tight.

Jim closed his eyes. His throat hurt, his chest hurt, his head hurt. But Spock was there. And it was okay. “Can we go back to the apartment?”

Spock nodded. “Yes.”

“Did you pay for breakfast?”

“Of course.”

Jim laughed but he didn’t let go, not yet. “Sorry.”

“There is no need. Let us go. We can talk more openly there.”

“Can we talk while I sit in your lap?”

“Yes.”

Jim pulled back and offered a watery smile. “It feels good to touch you.”

“It does.”

He noticed then that Spock’s eyes looked a little watery then too, which startled him. “Hey. What’s up?”

Spock shook his head. “It is only for the first time in a long time, I have hope.”

Jim swallowed heavily and nodded. “Me too. Come on.” And he took Spock’s hand and led him out of the park and when he went to let go of Spock’s hand on the city street as they headed to the apartment, Spock held on.     


	6. Near You I Always Must Be

Spock watched Jim looking out at the garden patio of the apartment with a sense of what Terrans would call Deja Vu. He had an overwhelming desire to hold onto Jim but for now he allowed Jim to dictate whatever was between them. Really he always had.

Finally Jim turned back to face him. “We chose this place together?”

“We made-we made all our decisions together. Those that affected both of us anyway.”

Jim smiled weakly and then stepped over to him again. He put his hands on Spock’s stomach, spreading them out toward the sides. “It must have been amazing.”

Spock nodded. “It was to me. To us.”

“I know how I feel now, so that doesn’t really…I’m pretty sure you’ve always been amazing and more than I deserved.”

He took Jim’s hands in his and moved them over to the couch. After all, Jim had expressed a desire to rest upon him while they talked, and Spock was eager to have skin contact with Jim after all this time of being forced to hold himself back.

Jim’s arms curled around Spock’s neck and Spock’s held Jim’s waist as they sat. He’d moved aside the material of Jim’s shirt so that he could touch bare skin directly, and he was grateful when Jim made no protest of his familiarity.

Jim’s tongue came out to moisten his lips and Spock tried not to find it arousing. Jim didn’t want such intimacy between them.

“Talk about us,” Jim said softly.

“Before you did not want to hear such things.”

“I do now. Anything you’d like to tell me.”

Spock considered. “I believe that it was me who first loved you.”

Jim’s blue eyes crinkled at this. “Yeah? Weren’t you with—?”

“Yes. I unfairly stayed with Nyota past when I should have because I was uncertain what to do with the overwhelming love I felt for you. It…pained me. At first.”

“You didn’t want to feel such things for me.”

“I did not. Both because I felt it betrayed my relationship with Nyota and because I had never felt such intense love and desire for anyone. It was…uncomfortable,” Spock admitted. “For a long time I fought it.”

“And then?”

“After Altamid, it began to change between us.”

“I read about Altamid.”

“You saved Yorktown,” Spock said simply. “And the lives of many of our crew. Prior to that point, I had decided to depart Starfleet for New Vulcan. I had determined that my unrequited love for you was no longer containable and it would be better for both of our situations if I put distance between us.”

Jim’s brows furrowed. “I put in for the vice admiral position on Yorktown. Is that right?”

“It is, though I was unaware of it at the time.”

“Do you know why?”

“I believe that you allowed your insecurities to get the best of you,” Spock said honestly. “Your doubts about your worth, your command abilities. It was not logical but then insecurities never are.”

“We got together then?”

“Shortly after, yes. After the Enterprise was rebuilt, we continued our mission, and during one of our planetary missions, I was injured. You became alarmed.”

Jim smiled at that. “Alarmed.”

“Yes,” Spock said softly. “You kissed me first but only because I had not yet found the nerve to initiate the kiss myself.”

To his surprise, Jim leaned in closer and captured Spock’s lips with his own. Jim’s lips were warm and soft and, as always, absurdly addictive. 

Jim pulled back a little. “Is that all right?”

Spock closed his eyes as Jim touched his lips again. “It is always all right.”

“I wish I remembered like you do.”

“I know.”

Jim shook his head. “Some things I am glad to have forgotten.”

“Yes.”

Jim’s lips found his again and Spock eagerly accepted the offering. If kissing and touching were all Jim allowed him, it would be enough. Just to be with Jim in any way was enough. And perhaps that made him weak and pathetic. Spock did not care. He needed his sun.

“If I did not die, why was our bond severed?” Jim asked. Then frowned. “If it was.”

“Given what you have said, I believe it was not. Merely damaged by what occurred during your captivity. Damaged so that I was unable to feel it myself and believed that it must have been destroyed given the pain I experienced at the damage.”

“And probably further damaged when you bonded to T’Mara’s mother.” Jim grimaced. “I guess I understand why your father insisted, given your condition, but I can’t help but be a little…irritated.”

“I would never do anything to deliberately hurt you, Jim.”

“I know. Or at least I think I do.” Jim leaned his head down on Spock’s shoulder, snuggling into him. Spock tightened his hold. “I just…how do you have two bonds?”

“I do not know either.” Spock paused. “But if you will come with me to New Vulcan, perhaps we can find out as well as repair the damage that was done.”

“To both of us.”

“Yes.”

“It makes sense to go but—”

“You fear the intrusion.”

Jim let out a shuddery breath. “I do. I know I should be strong, Spock. I know. But, God, someone fucking with my head caused so much pain, so much turmoil, going through that again—”

“It would not be like those who tormented you.”

“Logically, I know that. In my brain. In my mind. But my heart…I’m scared.”

“I would take away all your fears, if I could,” Spock told him. “I would die a hundred deaths to protect you. It-it is not logical, but—”

“Shh.” Jim put his fingers across Spock’s lips. “I do love you, Spock. As I am now. I just-I just hope that’s going to be enough for you.”

“It is more than I could have hoped for.”

“Okay,” Jim said softly. “Can you-can you give me some time? I’d like to stay here with you. Move out of my hotel. Stay here with you and just, I don’t know, be us, now. As we are. Spend time together. And then, when I’m ready, we’ll go to New Vulcan.” Jim caressed Spock’s jaw. “Would that be okay?”

“It is more than okay, Ashal-veh. I feel like I can breathe again.”

Jim gave him one his heart-stopping smiles and Spock’s heart clenched in response. “All right. Let’s go get my stuff and maybe we can go to the store and get some actual food in this apartment.”

Spock let Jim feel his amusement. “Very well. I will follow you anywhere.”


	7. Give Me One More Chance

Jim felt Spock leaning over him in the market as he surveyed the meat counter and butcher’s area. “If your desire is to consume meat, I will make no objection.”

He chewed on his lip. “I didn’t become a vegetarian when we were together?”

“You did not. Neither of us required the other to make significant changes. We accepted each other as we were.”

He smiled a little “How diplomatic of us. Okay, so if I get these breakfast sausages you won’t care?”

“Provided I do not have to consume them, I do not.”

“Great.” Jim added them and a couple of other types of meat to their cart. “This is kinda weird, I know.”

“To what do you refer?”

“I dunno. Us trying to be domestic. Well, me really. Being domestic with anyone I guess. All the stuff I learned about ‘the me that was’, I just don’t seem like I was the settling down shopping with my partner sort.”

Spock inclined his head as they moved on from the meat department. “You were not. Previously.”

“You changed me, did you?”

Spock frowned slightly. “Jim—”

“Spock.” Jim stopped and turned to him. “I don’t mean that in a bad way. Because obviously we _were_ together and I wanted to be, so you _did_ , in fact, change me. And knowing you as I do now, which admittedly isn’t as much as it should be, I can see why I would change to be with you. You’re amazing. Really.”

Spock nodded then and continued to walk but Jim could see that he had somehow managed to rattle the Vulcan. It was so frustrating not knowing what went on before. Reading about it was bullshit.

“Hey, I want to get some potatoes and eggs and something for dessert.”

“As you wish,” Spock replied.

“You want any special teas or anything?”

“I will go and look. Meet me at the front.”

Jim wondered if Spock just didn’t want a moment alone without the pain in the ass human who couldn’t remember their life but he allowed it and moved off to do more shopping alone.

There was a part of the market that had non-food items and for some reason Jim found himself drawn there. Once there he stopped before a display of ceramics. Cups, saucers, pitchers, and teapots. He smiled at them without a lot of interest until he saw one in the back from all the others. It was round with a long skinny spout for pouring tea and had a built in tea infuser. It was also red, brown, orange and yellow.

“Desert colors,” he murmured to himself.

And Jim didn’t know why but it was almost familiar to him and he decided Spock needed to have it. He picked it up and carried it over to a cashier that was just there for this sort of thing and purchased it before he met Spock at the front.

“Can you wrap that and put it in a bag for me? It’s a surprise for someone and I don’t want him to see it until we get home.”

The woman there smiled. “Certainly, sir. My pleasure.”

When he got to the front with the rest of his purchases, Spock was already waiting for him, looking vaguely concerned while trying not to do so.

“What is that?” he asked, noticing Jim’s bag.

“Oh. Nothing. I’ll show it to you later.”

So they got their groceries and headed back up the street to the apartment.

Jim could see why they would have chosen this neighborhood in San Francisco. There was something warm and cozy about it. Almost magical. He could imagine how they must have sat before a terminal and looks at locations and places and chosen it together. But that was the problem, wasn’t it? He could only imagine it, while Spock could remember.

He smiled anyway as Spock opened the door for them and entered the apartment.

“You’ve been really quiet, Spock,” Jim said as they put the groceries away. “Did I do something wrong?”

“No, Ashayam. This is also an adjustment for me,” Spock explained. “Until today, I had given up hope that we would be together again as I wished. It is not ideal for either of us, but the fact that you wish to even work on it with me is more than I could have expected.”

Jim sighed. “And that’s why I get upset. Spock, honey, the fact you expect sorrow and pain just…it’s horrible to me. I want to fix it so much. I want to fix us. And I don’t know how.”

Spock went to him then, right there in the kitchen, and pulled him close. “I merely want to spend the remainder of our days, whatever those are, together.”

Jim pulled back enough to stare into those dark brown eyes. He put his hand on Spock’s face. “I feel you in my head and in my heart somehow. Whatever they did to me, it can’t block you out, not entirely, you, us, it’s all too strong. I love you. So much.”

Spock closed his eyes and inhaled Jim.

Jim kissed his cheek. “I have a present for you.”

Spock opened his eyes and arched a brow. “A present?”

He laughed. “Yes. From the store. I don’t know. It reminded me so much of you, I just had to get it.” He grabbed the bag and removed the wrapped box. “It’s you. And Vulcan.” He dropped his voice as Spock unwrapped it. “And your mom. I don’t know how I know but—”

“Jim.”

He bit his lip, anxiety pooling in his stomach. “Do you-do you hate it?”

Spock swallowed and shook his head. “No, adun. It is…you are correct. It is my mother.” He released Jim and turned to a cabinet. He removed two very dainty cups that matched the pattern and color of the teapot exactly. He held them out for Jim’s inspection. “These were hers. Originally there was a set of four but over the years, two of them broke. One in an earthquake just after I joined the academy. She never had the teapot, but she often wished to find one that matched it.” He shook his head. “I do not know how you did it but you are a wonder.”

“Then, it’s good?”

“Very much so.”

Jim grinned. “Wait. Have I seen those cups?”

Spock nodded as he set the pot next to the cups. “Yes, you have used them with me before. When…”

“When?” Jim prodded softly.

“We had tea on the anniversaries of Mother’s death,” he said quietly. “You would join me, first in my quarters, and then later in ours. It became a ritual with us.”

Jim sucked in a breath, meeting Spock’s gaze. “I must…I remembered them somehow, didn’t I? I must have.”

“I am uncertain.”

“Spock.” Jim ran his fingers along one of the cups. “I did. I had to. The pot seemed familiar but-but I couldn’t quite…it was the cups. That’s what I recalled. Doesn’t that mean…”

“What, Jim?”

“There are memories trapped in me, somehow. They aren’t gone. Not all of them. The brain damage…it didn’t steal everything from me. Maybe I could—Spock, could I get them back?”

“Perhaps.” Spock pulled him close. “Perhaps there is a way. But do you want them?”

Jim nodded. “I want to remember you. Our life. If I have to remember the bad…I don’t know. But you? I’d give anything.”

He looked down at the cups and the pot and he had a memory flash, him lightly touching one of the cups to Spock. They were younger. And the quarters were Spock’s he was sure. They weren’t together yet. In fact…this was the first anniversary of her death he was remembering, Jim was also sure about that. He could even recall the feeling of falling in love then, when Spock was hardly free.

He touched Spock’s jaw and turned his face toward Jim’s. He kissed him.    

“I want you back, Spock. Whatever it takes. Meld with me?”  


	8. Light the Corners of My Mind

Spock’s fingers shook as they reached toward his face and Jim could feel the hesitation, the trepidation. They had moved to the couch, sitting very close together again, legs entwined though not quite sitting on each other.

“You don’t know what will happen, Spock,” Jim said, gently. “Maybe nothing.”

“Or maybe something.”

His fingertips pressed into Jim, his psi points. Jim flinched as Spock murmured the words, “my mind to your mind.”

A sharp pain in his temples made him grimace but it faded to a dull ache. There was a presence there, racing through his thoughts. Panic rose within him and he pushed at it, pulling back from Spock as though he had been burned.

“No,” he gasped, his breath coming in heavy pants.

“Jim.”

Jim stared at Spock, who had become very pale, his dark eyes stark and wide in his face, sorrow twisting his mouth. Jim felt instant regret and humiliation. His eyes pricked with tears.

“I-I’m sorry. I freaked out. I’m sorry.” He’d pushed Spock. What the hell was wrong with him? “Did-did I hurt you?”

“I suffer from no physical distress,” Spock spoke carefully.

A tear rolled down Jim’s cheek and he brushed at it angrily. “Fuck.”

“It is all right.”

“No, it’s not! What the fuck is wrong with me? I asked you to meld with me. I’m so fucked up.”

“Please do not be so harsh with yourself. The effort was, perhaps, too soon.”

Jim hung his head. “How can a Vulcan who needs-who needs to be bonded…God. You can’t have me. You were right. All along. When you said I was too unstable.”

“I will deal without a bond, if I must.” Spock reached for Jim’s hand and held it in his. “But there is still a chance that healers on Vulcan could help you. Our failed attempt at a meld does not preclude that.”

Jim bit his lip. “But this…all of this is so unfair to you. Spock, I don’t know if I can ever…” He trailed off. Put his hand on his stomach. “I suffered atrocities so great that my mind has shut them off. That scares me. Petrifies me. I’m afraid of sex. I know you won’t hurt me. I mean, I do, I know that. And yet—”

“I will live without physical intimacy,” Spock replied, his voice whisper soft.

“But. But you want it, don’t you?”

“I do not wish for you to misunderstand, Jim. The physical side of our relationship was more than satisfactory. Making love with you was beautiful. I will never want another. But I would rather have you in any way that is possible and if that excludes sexual congress, I accept that condition.”

“But Pon Farr—”

“As we previously discussed, there are surrogates.”

“You shouldn’t have to deal with a _surrogate_ ,” Jim said through clenched teeth.

“What then?” Spock asked. His voice was sharp, almost angry. “Am I to be parted from you once more then because of a biological urge I am doomed to have every seven years?”

“No. I…” Jim swallowed heavily and looked away. “I don’t know. That’s not what I want.”

“What do you want, Jim?”

“To be normal. To be whole again,” he whispered. “To not be so afraid. For it to never have happened. I want so many things, Spock. But mostly, I just want you.”

“Ashaya.” Spock took hold of both of Jim’s hands and held them tightly. “That is what I want as well.”

“I don’t want to hurt you.”

“I believe I have made it clear that the only thing that will hurt me is if you leave my side.” Spock let out a steadying breath. “As usual you imagine the worse, Jim. You do not know what the future holds for us. Perhaps you will not want that intimacy but perhaps you will. There is so much we do not know about your recovery.”

“That’s true.” Jim smiled just a little. “I’ve always been a bit of a pessimist. I’ve fought against it. All my life. Because I know…he wasn’t.” He frowned. “Or at least I tink I have fought against it.”

“Who, Jim? Your father?”

Jim shook his head. “James Kirk. The famous one. The one the other you spoke of.”

“You remember that?”

“Sometimes, yeah. Sometimes just what people have told me about then, about us, about him. I do get wisps of memories though. Fleeting things.”

“More will come to you then, perhaps.” Spock rubbed Jim’s back. “Are you hungry? I could make you something from what we just bought at the grocery store.”

“In a little bit.” Jim scooted closer. “Try again?”

“Jim—”

“Please? I want to share so much with you. I want to be-to be linked. To be a part of you. Please?”

Spock stared at him for a long time, or it seemed like it anyway, but finally he lifted his hand to Jim’s face, his fingers so incredibly gentle. His gaze met Jim’s but he made no further moves to meld them, just continued to watch Jim carefully.

Jim felt just the barest touch in his mind, a soft probing.

“Is that you?”

“Yes, ashaya.”

Jim nodded, moistened his lips. “That’s not so bad.”

“Let me show you a memory.”

“Mine?”

“Negative. Mine.”

 

_The landscape changed and they were no longer sitting on the couch in the apartment. They walked side by side, hand in hand._

_“Where are we?” Jim asked._

_“The Enterprise.”_

_The air seemed to shimmy and then they stood in the observation deck but it was strange, like they were outside of their bodies, and then Jim noticed that by the window stood Spock and him, younger versions of themselves._

_Spock held himself very stiffly next to then Jim and Jim was staring at him with undisguised longing as far as now Jim could tell._

_“Wow, how is it you didn’t see that?”_

_“See what?”_

_“The way I’m looking at you. Jesus, Spock. I’d call that worshipful.”_

_“Just watch, ashayam.”_

_The Jim and Spock by the window were speaking, so he leaned in to hear them._

_“Are you sure you’re going to be all right?” Jim asked._

_“I am not compromised.” Spock paused. “Mostly.”_

_“No? What caused the—”_

_Spock put his hands on Jim’s forearms. Jim drew back slightly with a gasp. “If my affection is not returned, I will—”_

_“Wait. What? Returned? Are you? Spock. Wait. Do you?”_

_“Yes.”_

_“God, I sound like an idiot,” Now Jim said with a snort._

_“Ssh,” Spock admonished._

_He watched as the pair by the window began to passionately kiss, so much so that he, himself, was practically crawling up Spock’s body. And Spock was letting him._

_“This was the start of it,” Spock whispered._

_“Why are you whispering? They can’t hear us, can they? Isn’t this a memory?”_

_“Yes. That night was quite thrilling.”_

_“Spock,” Jim moaned, sliding his hands under Spock’s uniform shirt._

_“Wait. We aren’t going to do it right here, are we?”_

_“Well—”_

 

The memory faded, withdrew, and Jim was once more looking at Spock as they sat on the sofa in the San Francisco apartment. There was no pain and no fear. He blew out a breath.

“That was amazing.” Jim leaned over and kissed Spock’s mouth.

“I wanted you to see how we began.”

“I want more. I want to see it all. Spock. Please?”

“Later. First, you need to eat. Later, in bed, I will show you more memories. That did not hurt?”

“No. Not at all. I loved it. Wow, I was such a sap for you.” He grinned. “But you stopped before—”

“I did not want to make either of us uncomfortable.”

Jim bit his lip and nodded. “Okay. But I can’t wait to see more.”

Spock rose from the sofa and pulled Jim with him. “I only hope they will help you. Come, let’s eat.”   


	9. The First Face That I See

There were innumerable things Spock appreciated about Jim. And he always would, no matter their ultimate outcome.

His physical beauty, of course. That was without question and without equal, in Spock’s mind, anyway. His bravery. Spock had known many brave men and women and had the privilege of serving with them, but Jim was the bravest of all he’d ever known. He would sacrifice himself again and again for his crew, for his friends, for others he barely even knew, for strangers. He truly believed ‘Better to die saving lives than to live with taking them’.

And whatever Pike had once screamed at Jim about blind luck, Spock knew differently. He also knew that Jim would have walked through fire to have saved Pike, and that he had mourned him for years.

His intellect, his gift for strategizing. His loyalty. Even his, sometimes, lame attempts to lighten the mood with dubious humor.

There was so much to admire and love about Jim.

But one of Spock’s favorite things, was admittedly, rather minor compared to his other traits. And that was his ability to be Spock’s personal heater. Since day one together, Jim had been toasty warm in their bed. Sometimes so warm, in fact, that he pushed Spock away, telling Spock he was roasting him.

That night, after dinner, and after Jim had a brief communication with Doctor Chapel, Jim had taken a shower, and then gotten into bed. He was turned on his side facing toward Spock, watching him, as Spock made his own preparations for bed.

It had been a while since he had shared a bed with Jim, circumstances being what they were, and Spock had greatly missed it. Something that the two most important people to Spock had learned, once Nyota and now Jim, was that Spock was a cuddler. Not widely advertised for obvious reasons, but it was true.

At least the Jim who had known him before his captivity had known this.

Spock pulled the covers back on what had been his side of the bed when they’d shared. Jim had just naturally gravitated toward his side as though it had always been that way, and, of course, it had. Some things were ingrained, Spock thought.

He lay down on the mattress, facing Jim, trying for the moment, to give him any needed space. His heart stuttered at the warm smile Jim gifted him with.

“You don’t have to keep your distance, you know.”

“I fear overwhelming you,” Spock admitted.

“Do I look overwhelmed?”

He did, actually, and Spock couldn’t lie, so he didn’t answer. There was just the vaguest hint of panic in those magnificent blue eyes, and it had been there, visible, since they’d rescued him. Spock was haunted by it.

Instead, he scooted closer on the bed until parts of their body touched, he could feel Jim’s radiating warmth that he had missed so much, but yet he didn’t lay over Jim, protectively, as he wished to do.

“Do you still wish to see more of my memories?”

Jim nodded. “Whatever you want to show me.”

That panicky look bothered Spock more than he presently wanted to admit, so he made the decision to show Jim something that did not involve them. He raised his hand to Jim’s face, spreading his fingers out over the psi points. For a moment those blue eyes widened and Spock almost drew back, but then they returned to normal and Spock did not feel any direct panic or reluctance from Jim.

“I worship you,” Spock whispered then. For Jim or for himself, he wasn’t sure.

Jim’s lips curved and Spock couldn’t resist a small taste. He pulled back though before giving Jim a chance to feel threatened in any way.

“Hey.”

“Jim?”

“You don’t have to be so…I don’t know…cautious around me.”

“I do,” Spock said simply. “The thought I might frighten you in any way disturbs me more than I can possibly relay.” He paused, swallowed. “It would…devastate me.”

“Spock, honey.”

“I told you before, you-you are all I ever wanted. I became involved with Nyota rather accidentally and T’ Mara’s mother out of necessity. But you…I have wanted you.”

Jim closed his eyes. “Show me a memory. Please.”

He could never deny Jim anything.

_“Mother.”_

_“There you are, kan-bu.”_

_Spock stopped in front of his mother who worked skeins of yarn into a sweater. This one was a soft, blue. She’d told him it was called ‘robin’s egg blue’. “I am not an infant, Mother. I am seven and ten point five months old.”_

_“And such a big boy.”_

_“You are, as usual, contradicting yourself,” Spock replied. “Father said you wanted to see me.”_

_She nodded. “I want to try this sweater on you before I get much farther.”_

_“Very well.”_

_She moved the sweater over to him and pulled the neck opening down around his head._

_“What is the purpose of this particular sweater?”_

_“You’re going to wear it when you’re bonded to T’Pring.”_

_Spock frowned slightly. “I am to wear the ceremonial robe.”_

_She rolled her eyes. “I know that. But after—”_

_“I do not want to bond with her.”_

_Mother straightened out the sweater. “I am sure you’ll change your mind and grow to—”_

_Spock shook his head._

_“No?”_

_“Negative. She does not want to bond with me either.”_

_“How do you know?”_

_“Stonn informed me,” Spock replied._

_“Stonn? And what does he know? Why wouldn’t she want to bond with you?”_

_“Because…” Spock looked away from her gaze. “You know why.”_

_“Spock.” Her eyes were sad when he looked back to her._

_“I wish to choose my own mate, anyway. Perhaps a human like Father did.”_

_“Your father chose me because it was logical,” Mother said, but she was smiling. She pulled the sweater off Spock and returned it to the pile next to where she sat._

_“Perhaps a human mate will be logical for me also.”_

_“Perhaps,” she agreed._

_“And he will accept me for who I am, the human side and the Vulcan side.”_

_Her smile widened. “I am certain that is true. Are you ready for lunch?”_

 

The memory faded suddenly and Spock was back to looking directly into Jim’s eyes.

“You were so cute.”

Spock knew by the way his face felt he was blushing. Only Jim could seem to bring that out in him.

“Thank you for showing me that. I love your mother. Even though…I didn’t meet her, did I?”

“No,” Spock whispered. “She…no.”

Jim nodded and leaned into Spock’s hand that still rested on his face. “I grieve with thee.”

Spock could not manage to say anything to that. Even now, so many years later, it hurt. Jim knew about his mother, of course he did. But there were times when even now Jim couldn’t recall even short term. Part of the damage, they’d been told.

And if Spock could personally tear apart every one of those who had hurt Jim, he would. Pacifist or not. Logical or not. He hated them.

“You said ‘he’.” Jim covered Spock’s hand with his own. “Even then, you somehow knew.”

“You were meant for me…always.”

“And you for me, Spock. That’s it, isn’t it? No matter what happens to us, what we’ve been through, where we came from, it’s you and it’s me. Together.”

“Yes, T’hy’la.”

Jim yawned then, loud and sudden. He laughed when it escaped, turning red. “God, I’m suddenly exhausted.”

And Spock knew he also tired more easily. The memories could cause some mental fatigue as well.

“Sleep, Jim.”

“But—”

“There are time for memories tomorrow and beyond. Your rest and welfare matter most.”

“Okay.” Jim yawned again. “I have a feeling I don’t deserve you.”

“You are wrong. We deserve each other. And you will see that too.”

Jim smiled again and pulled Spock close, for which he was so grateful. Long after Jim drifted off, Spock lay close, wrapped in him, listening to him breathe.   


	10. The Sound of Love's Arriving

Jim screamed himself hoarse scrambling up from lying beside Spock with such urgency he tumbled from the bed onto the floor in a mess of tangled sheets and blankets. His heart raced so fast his chest ached as though he might be having an attack. He rested his hand there, over his heart, and stared wide-eyed at the very pale Vulcan gaping down at him from the bed.

“What the fuck was that?” he demanded.

It took longer than usual for Spock to respond, so Jim realized he was just as affected as Jim was.

“A…dream,” Spock offered.

“That-that was no dream.” He swallowed the bile rising to his throat. He shook his head. “I’ve never dreamed like that.”

Spock swung his legs so that his feet touch the floor but otherwise he remained sitting on the bed, looking down at Jim from where Jim remained on the floor.

“Jim.”

“What?”

“In the past you had disturbing…nightmares. You woke often in a manner similar to what you just did now.”

“Fuck,” he whispered. He ran his fingers through his hair. “What about?”

Spock shook his head. “That was something you would never share with me. You did not want to discuss their content.”

Jim struggled to his feet then, resting his hand on Spock’s knee to use for leverage to pull himself up.

“Perhaps you should return to bed?”

“There’s no way I can sleep after that. But if you want to—”

Spock rose. “I will stay up also.”

They went out to the kitchen together and for a moment, Jim just stood there hugging himself, and Spock stood next to the fridge looking rather lost and uncertain. Jim hated that he’d put that expression on Spock’s face again.

“I understand warm milk can sometimes help with sleeping,” Spock finally said, his voice tentative.

He smiled in spite of the fact there was nothing to smile about. Not at the moment. “Warm milk? Where did you learn that?”

He saw the hesitation just before Spock’s gaze slid away. “Something from my mother.”

Jim went to him then, putting his arms around Spock’s middle. Spock’s arms automatically came around him and pulled him close. He rested his head on Spock’s shoulder, turning his face toward Spock’s neck.

“I’m sorry.”

“You never need to apologize to me, ashal-veh.”

“I know that isn’t true. I don’t need all my memories to know that I am a great big jerk some of the time.”

“You are not.”

He shook his head against Spock. “I really can’t imagine what someone like you could possibly be doing with me.”

Spock snorted, and it was a surprising sound coming from him. “That is something that has never changed, memory loss or not.”

Jim leaned back from him to look at his face, at his eyes, but he didn’t pull out of the embrace. He didn’t want to. “What?”

“Your insecurity. You are one of the most remarkable beings I have ever known and—”

“Only one of?” Jim teased.

Spock shook him a little, but without force or violence. “Jim.”

“I know.”

“I do not know that you do. But I love you with all that I am. All that I will ever be.” Spock framed Jim’s face with his hands. “Will you tell me of your nightmare now?”

Jim rejected the idea initially, it was so painful, so horrible, but even as he began to say no, he saw the dejected disappointment in Spock’s eyes and he stopped the words before they could come.

“It’s hard,” he admitted.

“Would you prefer to meld?”

He shook his head to that, feeling an unwelcome hollowness in his chest. “See, I don’t even know if I do. I mean those melds we’ve done, recently, they-they were nice. You showing me things. But…it’s…God, it’s just so frustrating not to even know anything at all about yourself.”

“You try too hard sometimes, T’hy’la,” Spock said gently.

“Or not hard enough.” He did pull away from Spock then and turned to lean against the counter in the kitchen, hands gripping the counter, facing away from Spock. “I…I dreamed it was you.”

“I do not understand.”

He laughed, and it sounded like a sob.

“Jim, please explain. Surely you do not mean that I harmed you. I would not.”

“No, Spock. I dreamed that it was you they captured and tortured. It was you. And it was…God, it was the worst thing ever. You came back, we rescued you, only…” He could not go on.

“I did not remember you. I knew nothing of our time together.”

He nodded and closed his eyes, feeling the rising bile again. “I don’t know how you manage to hold it together. I really don’t.”

Spock moved to stand behind him, his arms going around Jim’s waist and pulling him against him. “Because I must. I must be strong for you, Jim. I have wished every day since we found you that it was me instead of you, but—”

“No.” He turned in Spock’s arms and clung to him. “No. I couldn’t bear it.”

“Ashaya, we both bear what we must. We always have.”

“Sometimes it’s too much to ask of us.”

“Perhaps. But there is no one that I would rather be with than you. It is you that I would always choose.”

“After everything? Still?”

“Always.”

Jim sagged against him. “I don’t want any more dreams like that. I don’t want to dream at all.”

“If I could help you with that, I would.” He kissed Jim’s forehead.

“I know, you’re perfect.” Jim pulled away and gazed toward the window and the darkness, then back to Spock. “Warm milk, huh?”

Spock shrugged. “Mother swore by it, but me? I never tried.”

His fingertips came to rest on Jim’s cheeks, a light featherlike touch that soothed him.

“That’s nice. You should do that more often,” Jim murmured. “Unless it hurts you?”

“It does not. It is just something bonded couples can do.”

Jim arched a brow. “Could I do it for you?”

“Bonded Vulcans,” he corrected softly.

He smiled, even if it was just slightly forced. “Yeah. Sorry I can’t do that for you.”

“Your touch is a balm in a way you cannot even imagine. You need no psi abilities.”

“Yeah?”

Spock’s thumb caressed his jaw. “You truly have no idea how spectacular you are.”

He covered Spock’s hand with his own. “Let’s go back to bed and try to sleep some more.”

“Are you sure you can?”

He shook his head. “No. But maybe if we hold each other, it’ll be enough.”


	11. The Time We Have

The first time Spock penetrated Jim, both in body and mind, had been Spock’s own personal idea of heaven. There was no true concept of heaven to a Vulcan, and yet Spock, being half-human, and spending so much of his childhood in the company of his mother, and later years in the company of humans in San Francisco and aboard the Enterprise, he knew of it, and had developed his own sense of true contentment.

They had not made love immediately after declaring romantic feelings for each other, but it had not taken long, for Jim was tactile, at least then, and a sexual being, also at least then. Spock had found himself responding in kind to such delights of the flesh.

Being inside Jim’s mind had been like floating on a cloud, peaceful and breathtaking. The urgency he had felt as he thrust inside Jim’s body, held onto his hands as he rose above his beautiful, extraordinary human, flesh sliding against flesh, merging them together in every way, their shared cries of passion and orgasm, Spock would not forget it.

And each and every time afterward was the same. As treasured and intense as each time before. Until it had all been taken away.

At first, they’d all thought Jim dead. Taken from them in the cruelest way. His bond with Jim had been painfully severed, or at least it had seemed at the time, both by his alleged death and the Vulcan mind healers, and Spock had thought he would die himself. How was he to survive the loss of his t’hy’la? He could not, would not.

But he had. As his counterpart had done so before him.

Then to learn his beautiful, precious Jim was alive all this time, but in incredible torment, Spock had wanted to die all over again, for he had failed Jim. Had failed his beloved. A difficult thing to live with.

“I’m sorry,” Jim whispered, his hand on Spock’s face, mirroring Spock’s hand on his own as the meld faded.

“You owe me no apology,” Spock said, his voice hoarse.

They lay in bed still, side by side, legs tangled together, hands upon each other’s faces. Minds joined in the ultimate intimacy. Though Spock had technically ended the meld, they were still one, still joined, minds glowing together in warmth and affection.

“All that pain.”

“It came from not wanting you to experience such things. None of it was your fault. Ever.”

“Still.” Jim closed his eyes briefly and when he opened them again, they looked slightly haunted. “Did I get abducted through my own carelessness?”

Spock shook his head. “You were rescuing another who was in danger. You sacrificed yourself as you often did.”

His gaze dropped from Spock’s, and then rose once more. “Who was it?”

Spock hesitated only a moment before replying, “Nyota.”

Jim nodded slowly. “Now it makes sense how when I was first…rescued, she cried every time she saw me.”

“Yes, she…blamed herself for a long time.”

“It was no one’s fault but theirs,” Jim replied, even though just a moment ago he had been questioning his own part in his own abduction and torture. Always defending everyone else, but himself, Spock noted.

“We were very happy,” Jim said, softly.

“Happier than I have ever been.”

“And I hate them for taking that away from you.”

“Vulcans are taught not to hate. Not to give in to such negative emotions. They solve nothing and most often cause more damage, mostly to oneself, and yet, I hate them for what they have done. I hate what they did, yes, but more still, I hate them for their actions.” Spock brushed his thumb lightly against the lashes of Jim’s right eye. “It is an ugly feeling I can take no pleasure or comfort from.”

“Sometimes I barely remember what they did,” Jim admitted. “I don’t remember at all how I was captured. What I was doing before or that mission at all. I just remember waking up strapped to this-to this table with this thing attached to my head, and I-I was naked, and everything hurt so much.” Tears pricked his eyes. “I didn’t know why they were doing it or what they wanted or anything. _Anything_. I wanted to die. And I thought they were killing me.”

Spock felt tears of his own brimming. “I understand your desire to end your suffering and yet selfishly I am filled with gratitude that you did not perish.”

“You are tormented by the guilt of that,” Jim observed. “I feel it.”

“I-I try to shield it but—”

“Hey, no.” Jim’s fingers curved slightly in a caress against Spock’s cheek. “I love feeling what you feel, it’s amazing. Even the bad stuff.” He shook his head, smiled slightly. “No wonder I was so addicted to you.”

“I would not say you were addicted.”

The smile widened. “I would. I bet I was, because I certainly am now.”

“You were there for so long. We were parted for…I bonded with another. I—”

“Not successfully.”

“I had a child.”

“Yes,” Jim whispered.

“Sometimes it is as though we have not been together longer than we were.”

“It does,” Jim agreed. “All that you had with another, that should have been me, us. We could have gotten a surrogate, had T’Mara ourselves. Now you barely see her.”

Spock could think of nothing to say that would matter in the face of all that they had been deprived of together.

“What do we do, Spock?”

“I do not understand.”

“Are you sure all of this isn’t too late? You said before I was too mentally unstable to truly be your bondmate. And you talk of surrogates when it’s your time. Replacements for me and I just…”

“I will do whatever you want, Jim. That has always and will always be the case. I will not impose myself or my ways on you for anything or any reason.”

“You can impose.”

Spock shook his head. “No.”

Jim huffed out a breath. “So you would sacrifice everything for me?”

“Always.”

“Well, that’s just…Spock. I love you, I know I always have and always will, and I don’t have to have my memories restored or filled up to know that. I know it here.” He thumped his chest. “I want desperately to be with you for whatever time I have left. But only if I can be what you need. I don’t want you dying because of me, sacrificing yourself, your integrity, your Vulcaness, nothing.  I love and want you for who and what you are. And I will walk away if that is what is needed for you.”

“I would spend whatever time you have left with you. And if it is my destiny to live and die with you, then I can ask for no greater life.”

Jim pulled him close and held onto him and Spock’s heart, which had seemed to have momentarily stopped at the idea of not being with Jim for all time, began to beat again.

Whatever time they had, it would be together.


	12. Meeting Bones

“Are you quite certain you want to do this?”

Jim stood at the sliding glass door in the apartment looking out at the patio where their garden was supposed to be, according to Spock. Spock had come up behind him, making a good deal of noise, Jim knew, so as not to startle him with his approach. This filled him with both gratitude and sorrow.

Spock wrapped his arms around Jim’s middle and pulled him against him. His gaze rose to look out at the empty patio and the rain that fell on dirt there.

“No,” Jim admitted. “But I agreed to it.”

He was meeting Bones for lunch. That was all. Not such a horrible thing. And Spock was coming with him. Jim had asked. Spock hadn’t wanted to intrude, but Jim didn’t want to go anywhere without Spock.

Anyway, it was just a couple of hours over lunch with a friend. Nothing at all sinister or awkward or anything really.

“It’s raining,” he said, softly, obviously. Spock could see and hear it with his own eyes and ears.

“If you wish to cancel or postpone the lunch with the doctor, no one will care,” Spock said, his voice deep and soothing, pure warmth and love.

“Maybe.”

He felt the strange hesitation in Spock and in his mind before Spock said, “Dr. Chapel advised that you skipped your appointment.”

Jim sighed. “I don’t mind talking to Christine. I really don’t. It’s just…”

“You do not wish to keep talking about what happened to you,” Spock guessed.

He shook his head. “Not that even. I just…I find myself wanting to only be with you. I think, I don’t know, I’d be happy if we just settled into a house on New Vulcan and never saw anyone but each other.”

“Would you truly be satisfied with that, my Jim?”

He smiled then. “You use that a lot. Over the years.”

“You remember?”

“Well, I’m not sure if it’s my memories or yours mixed in, but yeah, that’s there somewhere.” He turned in Spock’s arms and wrapped his arms around Spock’s back, holding him very very close. “Part of me thinks I absolutely would. I’d pack this afternoon.”

“But?”

Jim laughed. “It would probably convince everyone I’d finally totally lost my mind.” He pulled back and gazed into Spock’s eyes. “Maybe I have.”

“No, Adun, you have not. I will do anything you want. But for now, perhaps, the immediate decision is whether we are leaving to meet Leonard.”

“Yeah, let’s go. If I ultimately become a hermit with you, it doesn’t have to be now.”

He moved away from Spock then, but only to get Spock’s rain coat and help him into it. He’d put his own on earlier. Spock’s had a hood, because, Jim had discovered, he did not like umbrellas.

As he pulled up the hood around Spock’s head and face, Jim smiled wide. “You truly are the most stunning, beautiful man I’ve ever known. And I can say that with or without memories of anybody else. Who cares about them?”

“It is you who are beautiful, Jim,” Spock insisted. “As I have told you over and over again during our acquaintance.”

“Yeah?” Jim teased.

“You have no equal. Not in my eyes. Nor in my heart. As you know.” Spock shook his head. “But you are fishing for compliments and affectionate words right now. You need not, they are always yours.”

“Come on, beautiful. Time to go out in the rain.”

They’d decided to walk, because really the restaurant where they’d arranged to meet Bones wasn’t very far from the apartment. They’d arranged this before the rain, but even still.

Jim didn’t bother with either a hood or an umbrella. He just linked arms with his Vulcan and headed down the street. When they passed the patio, Jim felt a moment of overwhelming sadness hit, and he wondered if it was from him or Spock, but really, it didn’t matter, because it was hard to separate them even in his mind these days. Spock might have thought their bond had been destroyed, before, but they both knew now that it couldn’t be done. Wouldn’t.

“Can we have a garden on New Vulcan?” he asked as they’d made it past the patio.

“Of course. We will likely be able to only grow plants native to that planet as well as Vulcan Prime in manufactured greenhouses.”

“Hm. I guess I have to become a vegetarian or something.”

“Indeed not. The beauty of replicators, Jim, is that they can replicate your hamburgers and other meat choices.”

“You’re making the idea of living there with you and shutting out the universe around us very appealing.”

“Technically you are still an admiral with Starfleet. I doubt they would easily release you from your duties to live on New Vulcan full-time.”

Jim swore. “Damn. There is that. Retirement then.”

“You are a little young for that.”

“Sure, now. Maybe. But in a few years…there’s Bones. He’s just going into the restaurant.”

They quickened their pace, more because the raindrops falling on them were fatter and heavier than a moment ago, than to catch Bones. If they took too long Bones would get them a table.

It turned out, though, that Bones waited in the foyer of the restaurant and he grinned at the sight of Jim and Spock, which had Jim thinking coming had been the right decision after all.

“You’re a sight for sore eyes,” Bones said, pulling him into a tight embrace.

“You too.”

But when Jim tried to immediately pull away, Bones tightened the hug and so Jim indulged him. When he finally did release Jim, he treated Spock to an equally long hug, which Spock likewise indulged.

“You two,” Bones said. “Are you back together? For good?”

“Yes.”

“Thank God. It’s just weird without you guys together. You’re like peanut butter and jelly.”

Jim laughed after exchanging a look with Spock. “If you say so, Bones,”

Bones’ smile softened. “It’s almost like old times. Hang on, let me get us a table.”

While Bones went to speak to the restaurant hostess, Jim went over to Spock and retrieved the hand he had let go of earlier when they’d entered the restaurant.

After a second or two he let Spock’s hand go. “Sorry.”

“For what?”

“I just…I know you’re a Vulcan. I know. I shouldn’t just assume that you’re okay acting all human just because I do. I mean, both times I fell in love with you, it was because I loved who and what you are. I shouldn’t expect you to be like me and you shouldn’t let me change you.”

“Ashaya, you are not changing me. After all that you have been through, after all that _we_ have been through, certain considerations and boundaries no longer seem so paramount in my life anymore. I am still Vulcan and I always will be, but that is not more important than you, than us.”

Jim smiled. “Yeah?”

“Yes.”

“All right, our table is ready,” Bones announced. “This place has a large vegetarian selection, Spock.”

“That was quite considerate of you to choose it then, Leonard.”

“That’s me, Mr. Considerate.”

Jim snorted. “I wouldn’t go _that_ far.”

Bones slung his arm around Jim’s shoulder. “Come on. We have some catching up to do.” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I want to thank those reading this particular story. I suppose it's a little self-indulgent. It's not action packed or anything and many times very little progress is made other than just more love between Jim and Spock, so if you are reading this and liking it (loving it), thank you. (And though this chapter has nothing to do with V Day, I think given their love, their beauty and gentleness, this chapter is appropriate anyway).


	13. My Melancholy Baby

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There's a bit of angst in this chapter

Leonard waited until Jim had excused himself to go to the bathroom to say to Spock, “Well? How is he really?”

“It is difficult to pinpoint. In some ways he has become more open and in other ways more isolated.” Spock paused to take a sip of tropical iced tea. “He speaks of moving permanently to New Vulcan.”

“And that’s bad?”

Spock shrugged. “I fear it is a way for him to shut everything else out.”

“Everyone.”

“Yes.”

Leonard’s fingers tightened around the stem of the wine glass he held. “If that’s true, I don’t think I blame him. Spock, you and I are closer to Jim than anyone, and that’s still true, even now after what happened, and there is still so much we don’t know about what he went through. Perhaps that he doesn’t even remember.”

“I think, honestly, he remembers more than he has ever admitted. To us, to his doctors. Some is gone because of the damage done to him, but not all.” Spock hesitated. “I could take it all from him. All those bad things. I have the capacity.”

“I know. And have you offered?”

“Negative. He already fears the idea of Vulcan healers probing his mind.”

“But you aren’t a stranger, Spock.”

Spock stared down at the appetizer they’d ordered. Fried onions. He shook his head. “To Jim, when we first brought him back, I was. We all were.”

“The human mind can only take so much pain and torment before it shuts down. Jim probably handled it better than most would have in those circumstances.”

“And yet…he is damaged.”

Spock felt Jim's approach only seconds before he appeared at their table. More a breeze brushing his mind. Jim stood there, with a hint of a smile, waiting for Spock to slide out of the booth to allow Jim to slide back in.

Spock was not certain why, but they’d always sat that way in booths. Jim in first, Spock second, on the outside. And they still did it, despite the lost years, and lost memories.

He was unable to tell by Jim’s expression how much he overheard between Spock and the doctor, or if he had heard any of it.

Spock’s hand rested on the table and Jim patted it rather absently as he turned a soft smile at Leonard.

“You look good, Bones.”

“Trying to butter me up for something, are you?’

Jim snorted a laugh. “Nah. It’s true. We haven’t really seen much of each other lately.” He dropped his gaze briefly. Then it rose again. “I haven’t really seen much of anyone but Spock.”

“What about Christine?”

“Ah. Well.” Jim shifted. “As I was telling Spock, I’ve kind of let our sessions go. I guess I’ll have to talk to her before. You know. When Spock and I go to New Vulcan.”

Leonard eyed Jim. “So you are going?”

“Not necessarily forever or anything, but I guess we should have them check out Spock and maybe me over this, um, Spock and I are still linked, you know, bonded.”

Leonard glanced sharply at Spock. “Didn’t they sever everything when you were bonded to the Vulcan female?”

Spock saw Jim glance at him, so he did his best to explain. “The type of bond that Jim and I have experienced is not ordinary.”

“Well, the whole thing isn’t ordinary to humans, Spock.”

“I am aware, doctor. But our connection is unusual even for Vulcans. While the bond given to us when we went through the ceremony on New Vulcan could be disconnected, severed as you say, our deepest bond, the T’hy’la bond we share, cannot be. Not without the death of one of us.”

“But it was believed that Jim was dead.”

“And yet he was not.”

“All this is why Spock feels we should go to New Vulcan and get things sorted out,” Jim said. “He’s not sure how my unstable mind has—”

“Jim.”

“Unstable?” Bones cut in. “Well, I know you’ve had some brain damage but—”

“Okay.” Jim held up a hand to stop their protests. “Look. I know the ramifications of the word ‘unstable’. It bothers me, too. I’m not certain that brain damaged is preferable. The point is I’m not the guy I used to be, when Spock and I first bonded, or when our T’hy’la bond became fulfilled. And I want to know if it’s harming Spock for me to be this way. He thought maybe it did.”

:”Jim.” Spock shook his head.

“You did. You can try to deny it now, but you worried about my instability making us incapable of being bonded. Come on, Spock, you know this.”

“Yes, that is true. But that was before-before…we became us again.”

Jim smiled and squeezed Spock’s hand. “I’m not sure we really are us again, but I think we’re making our way toward that, and if going to New Vulcan will help, we should.”

“You had doubts about that before.”

“I still do.”

Leonard made a noise, drawing both of their attentions. “Has Spock mentioned to you that he can remove any remaining harmful memories?”

“He hasn’t, but I know. Sarek offered some time back.”

This surprised Spock. “He did? You did not inform me of this.”

Jim shrugged. “We were pretty distant, you and me, at that time. And I didn’t accept. But it was offered. I can’t say I haven’t greatly considered talking to you about it recently.”

“Spock has a theory that you remember more of your imprisonment than you let on to us.”

Jim stared intently at Leonard, his blue eyes were deep and fathomless. “I remember a lot more than I’d like to, that’s true. They made me think…” His gaze skittered away from the doctor, landing briefly on Spock, before skittering away entirely to some point in the booth.

Spock saw the signs of panic in those eyes before they slid away. “Jim, you do not have to speak of this.”

“If I can’t talk to you two about it, whose left?” But he seemed very unhappy about this admission. “They made me think I wanted the stuff they did to me.” His voice had softened to the point it was hard to hear him. “I think that’s the worst part of it all.”

Spock turned his hand so their palms touched, then he laced their fingers together. He poured as much love through their skin contact as he could. Jim’s gaze returned to his.

The waitress came by with their dinners then and conversation turned to small talk mostly initiated by Leonard, though both Jim and Spock did their best to participate.

Things were not the same between the three of them as they had once been. Spock knew they were all aware of it. He also thought it might just be hardest on the doctor, for Jim seemed to solely focus his trust and love on Spock these days. He was not without affection and kindness for Leonard, but it was not the same, and they all knew it.

At the end of the dinner, Leonard held onto Jim for a long time, his eyes becoming more watery as he did so.

Spock felt very melancholy as they departed, Jim quiet and subdued beside him. The rain had stopped, for which they probably ought to be grateful, but the earlier rain had provided some distraction from deeper thoughts that were now back to the surface.

If only Spock had been there to save Jim from ever having been abducted and put through the ordeal. Regrets and wishing were illogical and, in Spock’s opinion, unbearable, too, and yet he had so many where his T’hy’la was concerned.

Once inside their apartment, Jim went straight to bed, not speaking more than a few words. Spock meditated.

It didn’t really help.   


End file.
